their prose works, literary influence, or other adventitious circumstances, than on the instrinsic merit of their poetry. Nor must the young English reader, as yet unacquainted with German literature, estimate the fame of many of the poets by the number of their poems here given. It was necessary to confine the selection to lyrical poems, and it is not on their lyrical poetry that the fame of a Lessing, a Wieland, a Herder, a Voss, a Schlegel, and a Simrock has been founded. With the living poets the difficulty of selection was increased, but the Author is more inclined to fear that he has admitted some who will not stand the severe test of time than that he has been guilty of any serious omission. The original text has been placed on the opposite page that the book may be useful to students of both languages, though, it is feared, it will at the same time act as a mirror, and reflect with increased vividness the defects of the translations. To the German reader, more particularly, who is but too apt to consider a poem well translated in proportion as it is literal, it must be remarked that the primary aim of a translator should be to infuse the spirit of his original into the idiom he uses, and depart from the letter rather than betray the foreign origin of his poem. Keeping this first grand object always in view, great care has been taken to render the original as literal as possible, for that only is a perfect translation in which the letter, the form, and the spirit are equally preserved. How difficult this is can be known. only to those who have endeavoured to accomplish the task. In every case the metre of the original has been adhered to, even to the ancient hexameter and pentameter for which, according to Bulwer, "The English language has no musical analogy." * The few odes of * Preface to his translation of Schiller's Poems. We must confess that we do not agree with this opinion. In proof of his assertion he gives the following celebrated distich of Schiller, as translated by Coleridge. In the hexameter rises the fountain's silvery colunin, In our humble opinion he must have an unmusical ear who can discover no music in these lines, which, we think, prove that the English language is equally capable of this metre with the German. It is true, we have had no Schiller, or Goethe, to familiarise our ear with it, though, in later times, Longfellow has done much towards it. Not that we would advocate its frequent introduction into our language, or, indeed, Klopstock here given, are, it is believed, now translated for the first time in the original metre. Criticism will doubtless find in the translations sufficient cause for blame, without cavilling at occasional imperfections in the rhymes, it is, therefore, perhaps scarcely necessary to repeat the words of Lord Mahon, “I would rather bear a faulty rhyme than lose a noble thought." Should the meed of public praise be denied him, the Author will endeavour to console himself with the pleasure which the execution of the work itself has afforded him. From his scholastic duties he has turned into any other modern language. Germany's great poets have clothed sublime thoughts in hexameter verse, but they have not succeeded in rendering it popular, in the true sense of the word. What German schoolboy, when he has to learn a piece of poetry, chooses one in hexameters? And how many millions know the long ballads of Schiller, Bürger and others by heart? Perhaps the best reason for not making too frequent a use of them is given by Schlegel: "Hexameter zu machen, Die weder hinken noch krachen, Das sind nicht Jedermanns Sachen." Diffident of our own powers, we have ventured to give in this metre only one short elegy of Goethe. aside to revel awhile in the fairy regions of poetry, and has derived from its lofty inspirations a gratification so exquisite that he will scarcely regret having committed the error of mistaking his vocation. To conclude, the Author returns his sincere thanks to the able corrector of the press, Dr. Felix Flügel, Junr. of Leipzig, to whose elegant taste and just criticisms he has been frequently and greatly indebted. Marienburg, near Cologne, December 26. 1853. CONTENTS. ALPHABETICAL LIST OF THE AUTHORS. Arndt, Ernst Moritz, born December 26. 1769 at Schoritz, in the island of Rügen, still living at Bonn. Arnim, Ludwig Achim von, born January 26. 1781 at Berlin, died January 21. 1831 at Wiepersdorf. Auersperg, Anton Alexander, Count of, better known by the name of Anastasius Grün, born April 11. 1806 at Lai- |